Marie Cosindas (1923-2017) didn’t intend to be a photographer. A textile designer by trade, she created abstract paintings filled with atmospheric color on the side. In the beginning of her artistic career, Cosindas saw the camera as a means for making design notes, nothing more. However, a trip to Greece convinced her that photographic prints could stand on their own as finished works.

When Polaroid sought photographers to test their new instant color film, Cosindas was recommended for the job. She immediately took to the process of instant-developing color film and, in so doing, proved instrumental in revealing the artistic potential of color photography. She made such exquisite still lifes and portraits that even Polaroid’s founder, Edwin Land, was astounded. This exhibition includes 40 of Cosindas’s one-of-a-kind Polaroid photographs and is the artist’s first major show in decades.